This is the week MHA members look forward to all year long! The annual meeting will be held later this week in Saint George, Utah. Members will hear speeches on Mormon historical topics from some of the best historians – both LDS and guest scholars – and will listen to papers on cutting edge Mormon history topics. There will be pre- and post-conference tours, meetings held over breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and plenty of time for private conversations and networking.

A number of Bloggernacle regulars will be delivering papers. The preliminary conference program (the only version online, alas) can be viewed here (pdf). This is the year that Bill MacKinnon, one of Keepa’s friends, has served as MHA President – he has overseen arrangements for the conference and is scheduled to deliver his Presidential Address (in which, I have reason to know, he will announce two significant discoveries in Utah War research).

Several people who are scheduled to deliver papers at the conference have kindly agreed to provide guest posts to Keepa. These include full posts drawn from some papers, and some abstracts and teasers that will give you a taste of what will be available to those who come to their sessions.

I’ll be posting these guest posts – in addition to regular Keepa posts – several times a day during the first part of the week. See what you have to look forward to … or what you’ll be missing.